In fact they claim they were promised the airport wouldn’t be commercialized when Atlanta sold them land years ago, though nothing in the contract requires that. Atlanta agreed to fight any new airport tooth and nail in exchange for Delta re-signing its lease last year.

Delta doesn’t want Paulding to open itself to commercial flights because Delta doesn’t like competition (as we know). Sometimes they seek federal action (Gulf carriers) and other times they seek court action (against a nearby airport).

Delta will now let you upgrade higher fare classes on their codeshare flights on Virgin Atlantic using SkyMiles. (HT: IadisGr8)

The real problem here is hotel union contracts than ban non union employees from picking up trash in the first place. Hyatt may have gotten slapped down in court because managers “set[.] up cocktail tables” in addition to removing trash and that violated a contract but there’s something wrong with both sides insisting on and agreeing to provisions like that in the first place.

More From View from the Wing

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

Comments

I think what Delta is doing is absolutely correct. In fact, other large cities should not only refuse to add capacity to ancillary airports, but any airport beside the main one should be closed immediately. That way, there’d be no quandary on whether to fly into EWR, JFK, or LGA, because EVERYONE would be forced to use JFK. Good thinking Delta!

The Paulding thing is no different than a dry cleaner signing a lease in a strip mall with the understanding that the realty company guarantees they won’t put another dry cleaner in the same strip mall. This is common business practice, not some admission of being anti-competitive.

Err, that would be like putting a McDonalds into an airport promising not to add a Burger King. This is promising that other businesses won’t build an additional strip mall in a different city. And it’s government making the promise to benefit one business.

Right, but Atlanta sold the land to Paulding with the understanding it would not be used to compete with Atlanta’s commercial airport. I could agree with you if this were just a nearby town deciding to jump into the commercial airport business, then I would say fine, good luck with that. But this is land Atlanta sold to them with essentially a non-compete agreement and likely represented to its “tenants” that there would be no commercial airport ever placed there. The “tenants” (Delta) would have actionable cause against Atlanta for the false representation upon which they relied in expanding its operations in Atlanta, which in turn gives Atlanta actionable cause against Paulding for breach of contract.

@Rob since it wasn’t part of the sale contract, wasn’t deeded that way, I think it’s a lot more complicated than that. A handful of politicians binding citizens how far into the future without even a formal vote?

@ Gary, I agree it is more complicated and they will have to make their case in front of a judge to determine whether or not that promise was legally binding or if a breach of contract actually happened. But a handful of politicians binding citizens to agreements far into the future without a formal vote is just called normal governing. That is why we elect people. Somebody has to be empowered to make binding agreements without formal votes on every decision or government could not function. And if it were enough to say…oh well we didn’t have a vote on it, so it’s not binding, then no entity would enter any kind of agreements with governments if there were some kind of escape hatch like that from every contract.

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.

Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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